"It's funny," Jayhawks co-leader Gary Louris said, "there was always a lot of time between records when we were still very active. Now, all of a sudden, there's all this material coming out after years of inactivity."
Music: The Jayhawks' Louris and Olson say the best is yet to come
A band that always seemed to suffer from strange timing, the Minneapolis twang-rock heroes might finally be benefitting from coincidence as it sees four albums issued over the course of one unpredictably action-packed year.
First came Lost Highway's reissue last summer of their little-heard 1986 debut. The run continued last week with Sony/Legacy's reissue of two of their best-remembered discs, 1992's "Hollywood Town Hall" and 1995's "Tomorrow the Green Grass," each bulked up with bonus tracks, photos and new liner notes.
The band's other chief songwriter, Mark Olson, said the expanded editions prove "we really spent so much time and poured our soul into those records."
Following the reissues, the Jayhawks will then quickly move on to releasing a new record that demonstrates what they might have done had their mid-'90s lineup stayed intact. The still-untitled new album will be the first Jayhawks disc with both Louris and Olson on it since 1995, when Olson quit the band. As was the case at their three First Avenue reunion shows last summer -- and will be when they return to the club Saturday and Sunday -- the lineup is the same as when Olson bowed out, with bassist Marc Perlman, drummer Tim O'Reagan and keyboardist Karen Grotberg.
Louris confirmed that the timing of all this was mostly coincidental. Last summer's First Ave shows, he said, were "just kind of a love fest between the band and audience, and within the band. We realized we were still a great band."
Reissuing the early-'90s albums backs up their claim of "unfinished business," and the new one will drive it home, he said. "It shows that we're not just a museum piece, but a living, breathing unit that still feels like it's on its game and can make a great record that stands next to the other ones."
Olson put an exclamation point on Louris' statement. "We've all stayed busy doing other things," he said. "Now, we're back, and I think we're in a situation where we're really a better band. All of us can play music on any level now."